Page:Pictures of life in Mexico Vol 1.djvu/167

Rh the affrighted dignitary to his companions; "for we know not at what hour the peace of our Zion may be threatened by these sacrilegious depredators."

And watch they did, night and morning, in parties; in obedience to the orders of their chief.

Many a dire alarm shook the hearts of those devoted old priests, as they performed their tedious duty, through the midnight hours, under the arches and vaulted roofs of the old cathedral. Often did they give themselves up for lost, when the echo of footsteps near the square, or the noise of the wind as it shook the fretted doors of the building, saluted their listening ears. The murmur of the breeze as it swept through the deserted aisles; the wandering's of the rats beneath the hollow wainscotings; or the crackling sound of some expiring taper as it sank into its socket, vibrated upon their overstrained nerves like the rush of a throng of plundering léperos, or the coming tramp of a band of mounted ladrones. Even their own voices, and the echo of their footsteps, became strange to them, as they cowered together and gazed from time to time into each other's haggard and